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278
WRITINGS OF SAM HOUSTON, 1851
intelligence in the community-a great deal of perception and scientific and philsophical acumen; but I ·will wager you have never taken into consideration one important fact in relation to her character for being a land of thieves, vagabonds, and rascals. It is simply this, that Texas is indebted for all the vagabonds, rascals, and scoundrels she has got, to the old States of the Union. Did you ever think of that before? Well, now, I admit that Texas was a little rude; but you must recollect that when I first went there, and for many years after, the Gospel was not preached throughout all the land. The exclusion or suppres- sion of the gospel of Jesus Christ was one of the oppressions that Christians felt. No preacher was there until the dawn of the revolution; then invocations were publicly made for the souls of the people and for the cause of liberty, but they were made under the oaks and arbors; no church was reared in honor of the living God, for his devotees to worship in. This was a subject that the people felt oppressed about, and it was the reason why morals might have been loose. But I must say this for T'exas, that churches are now rising up in little villages of five hundred souls, where, eight years ago, there was often but one house, and that, I am sorry to say, mostly a grog shop; and there are now often three or four congregations with their churches. This is what the revolution has done; annexation has given an impulse to improvement which is now going on with unprecedented rapidity; and I look for a further increase for years to come. This year at least 30,000 emigrants have crossed the Red River; next year there will be more than double or treble that number; and each succeeding year will team with industry and enterprise and labor. These are the benefits that flow to us; while the increase of our productions will supply your wants-our sugar and cotton will supply your enterprise. These are some of the advantages of the bargain. However, to return to the excuses I was going to give about the inhabitants. A new country is where men of enterprise, of daring, of rude and rough character, resort. Females will avoid the perils of the tempestuous life. The men that congregate there have not the restraints of society upon them; they trample down all the higher refinements of ladies, who are the chasteners of morals and the purifiers of the heart. Their company inspires a love of propriety and virtue, and whatever is noble, generous, gallant, brave or honorable. We had not their society; and when the evening came, after the day's toil was over, whether in the village or in the country,
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